INTRODUCING tlc_s05: A CODE TO FIT CEPHEID JHK BAND LIGHT CURVES USING A TEMPLATE APPROACH

We introduce a code called tlc_s05, to fit sparsely sampled JHK band Cepheid light curve data with template light curves to derive the mean magnitude. A brief description of the code is provided here. We tested the performance of the code in deriving the mean JHK band magnitudes using simulations, and we found that it is better to observe more than four evenly spaced data points per light curve, which permits tlc_s05 to derive accurate mean magnitudes for Cepheid JHK band light curves.